Hot Noodles and Bad Dreams
by Links6
Summary: Sasuke's been having silly bad dreams lately... Itachi helps! Brotherly! fluff


Disclaimer: I still don't own Naruto… or any of its characters… or noodles *cries*

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**Hot Noodles and Bad Dreams**

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"Itachi…" by now this should be habit for the older Uchiha sibling.

"Itachi…?" he should be used to it and find it cute.

"um… Itachi?" he should find it endearing, not annoying.

"I had a nightmare…" _yeah, and one that never ends_… for Itachi.

This had become almost routine in the past month. Itachi guesses that Sasuke might have unconsciously heard about the Uchiha coup and his imagination is now running free-range with it. Or, Sasuke's just a young boy with an overactive imagination, who heard one too many scary stories at the Academy. It was probably from Kakashi too, that guy had a sick sense of humour sometimes.

Itachi rolls over, not succeeding in stifling his sigh, "Hey… why aren't you sleeping?" he feigns ignorance, hoping Sasuke'd get imbued by the pride of Uchiha and decidedly excuse himself instead of admitting fear. But, Itachi forgot one thing, Sasuke Uchiha's got the blood of a Uchiha… but the guts of a little girl.

"I had a really scary nightmare… " Sasuke whines, pulling on Itachi's blankets to get the wanted reaction out of him.

'_Not again!' _Itachi can't help but think. "And….?" Itachi implores, yawning for effect. He's still trying to keep the tiny thread of hope alive that Sasuke would leave him in peace and that he can get at least four more hours of sleep before tomorrow's ANBU mission.

"Can I stay here… just for a little while?" Sasuke asks, finishing off the sentence with a sad moan.

Itachi knows he's a Uchiha, the blood, the guts, the all. But for some reason Sasuke always manages to wrangle some soppy sissy feeling from him without even trying. And, just like that, all the annoyance is drained out of him and gets replaced by affectionate amusement. "Sure… " he says with a roll of the eyes and a pull on the covers. Tomorrow's mission can wait until he manages to get Sasuke to sleep today.

"Thank you…" the younger brother quickly climbs in and shuffles in the covers to get comfortable. And shuffles.

And shuffles.

And shuff-

"Sasuke?"

The shuffling stops. "Yeah?"

"Are you comfortable?" Itachi's got his head buried in half his pillow now. He _knows _Sasuke only shuffles around like that when he's got something to say.

"Uh-huh…"

"Will you be able to sleep?" Itachi says, unintentionally yawning at the idea of continuing what he'd been busy with just a minute ago, but knowing he won't be able to – not until Sasuke's asleep.

"I don't know…" comes the ever-so-honest Sasuke answer.

Itachi's pretty good at reading into the motives of others. He can spot a lie a mile away. But he doesn't need to be a genius to figure out what was the issue still. "Tell me about your dream…" he finally says, fighting to keep his eyes open.

"We were in the village and we were walking down the street…" Sasuke starts, his breathing starting to quicken at reliving the nightmare again, "and-and you told Mommy you had to go fishing and then – and then-"

'_Fishing? Why does he always think I go fishing?' _Itachi wonders absently. "Go on…" Itachi says, smiles and lazily pats Sasuke's hair.

"-and then people started throwing hot noodles at me! And mom was gone! And the noodles were flying everywhere! And it was burning- _Itachi, are you asleep!?"_

The older brother's eyes snap open at once and he smiles sheepishly, "Just resting my eyes… " he lies and hopes Sasuke would just go with it, "so… noodles?"

"Yeah… It got all over my clothes and it was really hot… and then I woke up…" suddenly an extremely embarrassed Sasuke sighs and rubs his arms, looking troubled. There were the two problems: Embarrassment from dreaming of scalding noodles being tossed at you and the anxiety of the possibility of the scenario in the dream actually playing out.

One sensible part of Itachi's brain tells him that hot noodles are not exactly life-threatening, but the other part knows that dreams that are scary when you're young aren't scary when you're older. But, the big brother knows when to make jokes and when it's time to just be there for your baby brother.

"Hey, hey… it's okay, ne?" Itachi says and knows the whole it's-just-a-bad-dream route won't work on his brother –_never has. _He simply runs a hand through his younger brother's hair as a simple affectionate sign and smiles reassuringly, "You know I would take you along if I were going fishing, right?"

Sasuke sniffs, "Right"

"And you know I'll always do what's best for you, right?"

"Right…"

"And I'm strong enough to take on anyone, right?"

"Uh huh!" comes Sasuke's confident reply.

"That means I'll protect you, okay? … and besides-" Itachi says but pauses when an unintentionally loud yawn suddenly escapes him – and, because yawns are contagious, a now peaceful Sasuke also ends up yawning at the same time. He tries again, "…. Besides, if you're worried about noodles, I'm sure your ramen-crazy friend, Naruto, will be there to protect you from those too…"

Sasuke giggles and allows Itachi to finally tuck him in, "You're right…"

And this time, Itachi doesn't have to ask if Sasuke will be able to sleep, because the younger already is.

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**Thanks for reading!**

Please drop me a pm or review if you enjoyed it ;)


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